Hacking Sweden For Expats

5 Recognition of Foreign Qualification Hacks

You are looking for work in Sweden or you wish to continue your studies in Sweden. Maybe your first thought is that you need a degree nostrification, verification or recognition. Before you start with that tiresome process, read our tips.

1. A majority of professions do not need a recognition. It does not matter if you are a computer scientists, a hairdresser, an accountant or a basket weaver, there is no legal requirement for you to get recognized in Sweden.

2. Unless you stumble upon very suspicious prospective employers, you don’t have to waste your time on UHR. Swedish Council for Higher Recognition (UHR) is often recommended by Swedish Public Employment Service (Arbetsförmedlingen) as a place to prepare for your job hunt, but it is unnecessary in a big majority of cases for both licensed and unlicensed professions. They can evaluate your foreign qualification, but they do not provide licenses.

3. Even if your profession is one of the licensed professions (reglerade yrken) that need a recognition, you can still work with something similar without a recognition. For example, if you need a license to practice your profession as a psychologist, that does not mean that you are forbidden to work as a life coach. You do need a license to work as a nurse (sjuksköterska), but you don’t need one to work as an assistant nurse (undersköterska), patient care technician (vårdbiträde), or a personal care assistant (personlig assistant). Although teachers should be licensed, a half of teachers employed in the school year of 2016/2017 were unlicensed. This can be a good choice if you want to start working immediately.

4. All right, you really do need a recognition and you don’t want to work unlicensed in a lower paying profession. Find a competent authority for your profession. There are different authorities for different professions.

5. Prepare before starting the process. Do not send your papers one by one, do not apply thinking that you can send your language certificates later. Although you can send missing documentation later, this will significantly prolong your waiting process.